


Dangerous Business (and all that)

by Miri1984



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: M/M, grief and grieving
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:14:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22563838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miri1984/pseuds/Miri1984
Summary: Zolf had already grieved, or so he thought.
Relationships: Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde
Comments: 7
Kudos: 81





	Dangerous Business (and all that)

“How is Sasha, by the way?”

“We lost her.”

It hurt. A short, sharp stab of what Zolf recognised all too well as guilt in his gut, but it was duller than it should have been, because he’d already mourned them, and there was the all too real possibility that Hamid - that the thing that looked like Hamid - was lying to him.

They’d lied about so many things, to so many people, back before they’d worked out how to check for infection. Oscar’s face was scarred because of their lies. The world was forever changed because of their lies. Zolf’s old, festering guilt didn’t need to be revived right now.

They had a job to do.

“Dangerous business, and all that,” he said, and he could see hurt in Hamid’s eyes. Justified, maybe, that Zolf could dismiss Sasha’s loss so easily. 

Brave New World.

One that Hamid didn’t understand.

#

“You’re not asking about them,” Zolf said, quietly, at the door of the cell. He only came in once a day, to watch the inspection, and he didn’t talk to them the way that Zolf did.

“We don’t know that it is them,” Oscar said. “Don’t fall into the trap of behaving as though they are.”

“You know Hamid passed his…”

Oscar grasped his upper arm, shaking his head. “Zolf don’t make the same mistakes I did,” he said. 

Zolf sucked in a breath, then let it out slowly. “I’m not,” he said. “I’m not making that mistake, Wilde.”

“Don’t talk to them,” Wilde said. “You’ll be sorry if…”

“They’re already dead,” Zolf said then, bitterly. “They’ve been dead for more than a year. And I might be able to learn something.”

Wilde swallowed. “You deserve better,” he said, softly. 

“Better than what?”

Wilde touched his scar. “Better than this.”

Zolf wasn’t sure if Wilde meant his scar, or himself.

#

They weren’t infected. Zolf hugged Hamid, trying to put into that hug all the apologies he’d rehearsed before he knew Hamid was gone, trying to convey the happiness that he was back, trying to apologise with more than just his words.

Hamid was stiff and unresponsive, but Zolf didn’t have anything to compare it with, did he? Back in Prague he’d been stiff and unresponsive. How were hugs supposed to happen?

_#_

_He’d learned, in these months with Wilde, how to give and receive comfort. Perhaps in the time muddled gap between when Hamid and Zolf had last met, Hamid had forgotten._

#

He’d never hugged Sasha. Never touched her except to examine her when she was hurt.

#

They went to meet Cel. Zolf knew a little bit about the Alchemist, from reports, although even now they were habituated to only sharing the barest minimum of information. Wilde was the keystone, the centrepiece. Wilde was the one they protected against infection with utter vigilance. If he fell, most of their work in Japan would be lost. There were caches, caches that only Zolf knew the codes and locations to, but they were sealed in case of disaster and were difficult to keep up to date.

The kind of disaster that would require Zolf to access them was not the kind that Zolf was happy to contemplate.

Nothing felt right, in Cel’s village. Having Hamid there made Zolf clumsy and awkward. He kept expecting to turn and see Sasha standing behind him, but more often than not it was just a giant wall of pink armour, or a gangling half-elf with a crooked smile.

Hamid’s presence felt lopsided, incomplete, and it didn’t help that Hamid himself was unwilling to talk. 

Zolf never had gotten good at talking, either, despite all the practice. Wilde had teased him about it.

Gods he was finally doing something useful, they were finally making progress in the fight against Shouin, and Zolf was _missing Wilde._

He was an idiot.

#

He went back to give his report to Wilde alone, the trip through the rain and the muck easier to deal with than Hamid’s large, sad eyes, than Azu’s quiet grief. He’d already mourned them, but there was a knot of feeling in his chest for the one he was missing, for the woman he’d left when she’d needed him most. 

He gave his report. Wilde made notes, nodded, did his job. Then he set aside his pen and looked up at Zolf. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, softly.

Zolf was not okay.

#

Oscar cradled Zolf’s head against his chest, tangled fingers in his hair, smoothed salt tears from his cheeks and kissed away their trails.

“I left her,” he choked out. “I left her when she needed me, and now she’s gone.”

Oscar didn’t speak, just held him, and let him grieve again.

#

“Everything all right, Zolf?” Hamid asked when he returned, hollowed out from tears, but calm.

Zolf sighed. Clasped Hamid’s shoulder.

“No,” he said, but he smiled a little as he said it. Hamid shook his head and smiled back.

“I missed you, Zolf,” he said.

“Yeah,” Zolf said. “Me too.”


End file.
